Besides coins...

[the_Thing ®]

Yarm, those tortoises are great! Climate wouldn't allow me to have any like that here. I do have 1 or 2 small turtles (about) 6 inches long, with bright shells, living under my deck in the backyard. I'm not sure how they survive the winters here, but the seem to do OK. If I knew what they ate, I'd try to keep some food under the deck for them.

[WhiteTornado]

It's a bit OT, but I thought turtles tend to eat things like vegetables (especially leafy greens) and even fruits.

[Bruceswar]

I forgot 2 more hobbies I have....

 

Photo taking

Hot Air Balloons

 

[Wihlborg]

I thought turtles tend to eat things like vegetables (especially leafy greens) and even fruits.

 

Phil,

 

Tortoises yes, turtles no. Most turtles eat meat of some sort or another, bugs, fish, frogs. Here is a picture of my daughter’s Leopard tortoise.

 

 

I got her as a hatchling about the size of a ping pong ball. Now, 3 ½ years later she’s about the size of a large oval serving plate. She eats three or four bunches of greens a week, heads of lettuce, escarole, dandelion, etc.

 

John

[jgrinz]

Aquatic turtles are 99% vegitarian although they do eat occaisional worms now and then. ( Remember when you would be fishing as a kid and catch a turtle ) Aquatic turtles hibernate in the winters under water. They go land bound to lay eggs AND there eggs can over winter and hatch in the spring hence the turtle I have for a pet. I almost mowed him in the spring and he is about 6 months old now. Romaine lettuce is fine if he is a land veggie eater or Worms if he is meat eater.

 

 

 

MEET FRED ! Could be a FREDERIQUE too soon to tell

[WhiteTornado]

And there you have it. More tortoise and turtle knowledge than I ever thought I'd read here.

[Wihlborg]

Cool photo Bruce.

 

There are about three or four companies that give hot air balloon rides in my area. I see hot air balloons all the time from my front porch, back deck, or just riding around in the car.

 

Sometimes they even land on my street. When that happens all the kids in the neighborhood come out and the people who run the balloon rides give them toys, Frisbees, etc. I have been told that if they land on your property they give the owner a bottle of champagne.

 

John

[ldhair]

This little guy is one of several born in our gardens this year.

[Yarm]

 

 

 

............Desert tortoises do just fine on grass and weeds with some veggies and fruit thrown in. The house in my prior post has 2-zone heat for the winter when temperatures in the desert drop to freezing. This has nothing to do with the hard times token shown.

[Bruceswar]

John the champagne is a toast to a good sucessfull fight. You will get to share it with the pilot and the crew. I have always had a thing for ballons they make for some of the best pictures.

 

[jgrinz]

 

When I found him ..

 

 

[Wihlborg]

Hey Bruce,

 

I took these photos from my front porch about 40 mins ago. Thought you might like them.

 

 

I was leaving to bring my daughter somewhere and saw the balloon. I ran back into the house to get my camera and took these. I then brought the camera back into the home and left.

 

I should have brought it with me though because only a short distance down the road, there was the balloon landing in a field. I could have gotten some great photos of it.

 

John

[Bruceswar]

John nice photos. A sport Balloon, which will run you about $ 15,000 to $25,000. Envelope, basket, and all the burners etc. Such a cool thing to get involved with.

[Bruceswar]

This seems very fitting. A bit of photo shop work was done.... The Balloon was added in...

 

[WinstonWare]

So it appears that the majority of us enjoy hot air balloon rides and turtles. Not sure what to make of that

[Bruceswar]

So it appears that the majority of us enjoy hot air balloon rides and turtles. Not sure what to make of that

 

Winston ever been on a balloon ride?

[WinstonWare]

No I haven’t. There were quite a few not too far from where I lived back when I lived in Colorado. It is something that I should probably try.

 

I’m not entirely sold on the turtles though

[Stanley]

So it appears that the majority of us enjoy hot air balloon rides and turtles. Not sure what to make of that

 

Winston, I like turtles and hot air balloons as well, but my favorite is wrestling alligators and milking rattlesnakes.

[WinstonWare]

Winston, I like turtles and hot air balloons as well, but my favorite is wrestling alligators and milking rattlesnakes.

 

I guess I was supposed to put something more adventurous. I did do some hunting/fishing/hiking in Colorado. I got this elk with my win94 30/30 – iron sights, no scope for true cowboy action enthusiast

 

[rexcat]

Rexcat, nice work. What kind of setup? I'm mainly into planetary, with a special interest in Mars. I had my 15 seonds of fame on CNN, MSNBC, Space.com and some other media outlets in 2005 due my discovery/image of a dust storm on Mars.

 

 

Holy krap Thing!

 

That’s some mighty fine astro pics you got there.

 

I don’t think if many here really know just how good your shots are, man this is the stuff astro magazines publish.

 

I’m guessing you’re stacking a lot of images and spending some quality time at the computer?

 

Far out on the discovery! Way to be there.

 

What do I use? A couple of scopes are a 25 inch, f/15, classical Cassegrain telescope on an equatorial fork mount under a 22 foot diameter dome, 10 inch, F6.3, LX 200 with an SBIG ST9 CCD camera, it’s remotely controlled from a heated lower level of the 22 ft. Dome, this is most useful up north here. My favorite though is a12.5 inch F7.4 Newtonian telescope on a German equatorial mount and another ST9, this is in another smaller dome.

 

No I’m no rich dude with endless cash for astro toys, (I collect coins you know ) but have been very active in my local astronomy club for decades and have done a lot of work along with many members in getting the clubs observatory to the state it is day, these efforts have been on going since the 1930s so the club has one of the best amateur observatories around. Here’s a link to the clubs web site: Milwaukee Astronomical Soc Home page

 

lots of photos of the scopes, domes and other astro junk

 

 

Personally I have a 12.5” Portaball for taking look sees and a medium sized German equatorial mount that I use 28mm to 400mm telephotos with, it’s light enough to travel with so I can get to dark skies.

 

Here’s a 60 degree (roughly) shot of the center of the Milky Way; taken from a 10,000 ft. summit. It was real dark there.

 

 

Makes a great 20 x 20 inch print.

[the_Thing ®]

A man with his own dome I'd love to have any of those scopes. I have an 8 inch SCT, shoot everything alt/az. I really admire you guys who image the DSOs and such. Its a lot harder than what I do. In regards to getting the pics, that Mars image you quoted, from scope set up to getting the finished product, I can usually do it in an average of 30 minutes. LOTS of processing practice allows that. But I usually always go back and tweak some during processing. Generally, in good seeing, I stack between 500 and 900 frames at 10 fps. excellent seeing, sometimes 1000 +, shot at 5 fps. I was lucky enough to have a few published, and nothing definite yet, but some might be going into printed books in the near future. Below isn't my best Mars image, but I was able to do what I wasn't possible with an 8 inch scope. I was able to image Olympus Mons, including its shape and the surrounding dark plains it sits on.